This is a Window Cleaning Network resource for the glass, construction and window cleaning industries, and owners of new homes and buildings.

This website focuses on one
issue -
excessive
abrasive fabricating debris defects on
some
uncoated
tempered glass surfaces. The
mission here is to provide credible information, and to increase demand
for quality tempered glass surfaces.

Builders
and homeowners have taken the hit for millions of dollars worth of damage to tempered
glass. They may have blamed window cleaning practices for this damage,
often without realizing that fabricating debris may have been the root
cause, or without understanding how an uncoated tempered glass
surface might have so much fabricating debris that it
will scratch so easily.

The issue here is why
some
uncoated tempered glass - but not all - may be so laden with abrasive fabricating debris
that it will scratch when you clean it with a standard window cleaning
scraper. Fabricating debris is an inherent problem with tempered glass,
but clearly
some temperers do a good job of minimizing it, while others do not.

We've been urging
fabricators to test their own glass for this problem since 2005.

Builders, architects and
remodelers who understand that fabricators are able to minimize
fabricating debris issues can specify tempered glass surfaces
without excessive fabricating debris - surfaces that can be cleaned
efficiently with standard methods, not only after construction, but
throughout the life of the home or building.

A "perfect" surface is not necessary.
What is needed is a surface that does not have so much fabricating
debris that it will scratch when you clean it with a window cleaning
scraper.

It takes about 16 hours for tempered glass
scratches to grow - up to ten times wider than they first appear.
They will grow wider
- not longer.)
One study said, "Macroscopically visible chipping of
glass fragments at the scratch face widens scratch tracks from typically
20-30 [microns] to 200-300 [microns]."

Some of Gary Mauer's first photos of this
effect - before and after a tempered glass scratch grew.
While observing the this segment with a shop microscope about 45 minutes
after photographing the new scratch, he observed the distinct, sudden
scratch growth shown in the after image.
It made a tiny “poink” sound.

Too many professional window cleaners
mistakenly believe they can avoid fabricating debris scratches on
tempered glass by following GANA's advice to stop and check a small area
or one small window for scratches.
They have to be warned about tempered glass scratch growth.